


Tactically Speaking

by fluidstatic



Category: Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy XII
Genre: Espionage, F/M, I Will Go Down With This Ship, Inspired by Edge of Tomorrow
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-10
Updated: 2018-03-10
Packaged: 2019-03-29 16:42:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13931103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fluidstatic/pseuds/fluidstatic
Summary: Quistis is just doing her job until Balthier Bunansa shows up and turns her classroom and her heart inside out. He comes bearing gifts and secrets. She wants to trust him, but will she figure out how before it's too late?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sissyhiyah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sissyhiyah/gifts).



Classroom 3A gradually fills with the sound of footsteps on the tile floor, the shuffle of messenger bags and notebook paper, the mumbled conversation of a few early-bird students. Quistis glances at the clock. She already has a headache, and a fat stack of transcripts sits by her elbow, taunting her.

The first day of second term is always the worst.

Xu walks past the desk; her fingernails drum lightly on the corner in her usual stealthy greeting. Quistis quirks of the corner of her mouth in return, sets down her red pen, flexes her knuckles.

Slap. A brand new folder lands on the top of the stack of transcripts, wafer thin; even the serial number on the front's still wet. surprised, Quistis slips it off the stack and skims the note stapled to it.

Bunansa, Ffamran M.  
Transfer student, Galbadia.  
Year 2, Tactical Engineering.

Huh.

The bell rings. Quistis shuffles the folder into a drawer and rolls her shoulders; The first row straightens adoringly, a line of tediously familiar faces that hang on her every word.

She's already bored, but she's learned not to show it. Her smile stretches warm and wide: Showtime.

"Welcome back, everyone. Let's get right to review this morning, all right?"

A general moan ripples around the room. Quistis patiently pretends not to hear it.

"Who can tell me: In a ground advance when the opposition isn't immediately apparent, What are the two protocol procedures most often recommended in drills?"

"Defensive and Offensive bluff," A small bored chorus of voices replies.

"Thank you. Can anyone tell me why?"

This is two plus two for a SeeD, but Quistis needs to know who's awake. She looks over the bridge of her glasses at the front row and the students glance around at one another, all wearing the same thinly veiled expression: You gotta be kidding me.

An annoyed silence lingers. Quistis counts to five, then restates her question:

"Who can tell me the advantages of defensive procedure versus offensive bluff procedure on the ground?"

"C'mon, Trepe, Do we have to go over this again? They're practically the same... thing," Seifer calls from the back row, stifling a yawn.

"...Not necessarily."

A voice like molasses melts from the far left corner of the classroom, startling everyone. Heads turn; one first-year even stifles an alarmed giggle. The student's face is much too young for his voice, and it takes Quistis a second to remember the thin clean folder in her desk.

"I... oh, Mr. Bunansa. Welcome to Balamb," Quistis says, adjusting her glasses to hide her surprise. "Forgive me for not introducing you. Wasn't expecting... well, I only just received your file."

The transfer student pushes his rimless spectacles up his nose. "Not at all. But - That's Balthier, please, Miss Instructor."

"'Instructor Trepe' will do, Balthier."

"Of course, excuse me – prep school habit." His pale cheeks color handsomely for a moment, and Quistis realizes, to her own horror – He's awfully cute, for an engineer.

"But, if I may," He says, still horribly formal, "As per your review: Is the unit in question advancing on high ground or low?"

Quistis mentally reigns herself back in to her lesson plan, and immediately frowns. She hasn't considered any specifics for her scenario. Dollet floats into her mind, statistics vaguely swimming into focus; she recites.

"...SeeD advances from the water. Target's inland by a mile and a half, approximately."

The student ticks a note on a sheet of paper. "Hm. Is the unit in question running independently, or commanded remotely?"

"The hell?" Seifer mumbles, incredulous.

Quistis narrows her eyes. "Independent. Commander's on front line and backup's an hour away, if that was your next question."

Balthier nods – if he's caught her defensive tone, he doesn't seem inclined to make a fuss over it. "It was."

In the front row, Xu looks up from her notebook and gawks. But Quistis would rather appear annoyed than impressed - she looks at Balthier down the bridge of her nose.

"You're certainly thorough. But why is this relevant?"

His lips curve. "Well - Remote command means a unit is more likely to fall back on instinct than take their time following protocol, doesn't it? Anyone who's ever run a drill knows that offensive bluff formation looks a bit like Swiss cheese once the radios turn off. If the target in question is a mile in from shore – and I assume by SeeD's drill schedule that you're inferring Dollet Tower as your example – then it'll be a long waltz in. Defensive is best. No-one in their right mind can afford to get caught asleep on Dollet ground."

The room is so quiet now that Quistis swears she can hear the air conditioner in the next room. The note of pride in Balthier's voice at mention of Dollet tower doesn't go unnoticed, either – a couple of first years send each other meaningful glances. But he's using ground level tactical logic; Quistis can practically see him counting meters from the beach to closest cover. She folds her arms, and finally allows herself to smile in approval.

Seifer's been squirming in his seat with frustration, and he finally lets out a groan.

"Defensive on low ground? Give me a break. Dollet Tower's nothing but first-year drill bullshit. I could run offensive off the water stright into the compound with my eyes shut... Unless the unit was full of mommy's little tactical engineers."

A handful of third year combat students laugh, met with a scattered hiss from the engineering students. Seifer sneers openly at Balthier as the smaller, calmer student raises his eyebrows and pointedly flicks a bit of imaginary dust from his second-year engineering pin.

Quistis scowls. "Speak out of turn again and you're in detention on Sunday, Almasy. Now – Balthier – you mentioned Swiss cheese. Explain this to me."

Balthier's icy disdain softens immediately, and he's all charm again. "Of course. Remote command ruins formation on low ground; it's basic pack-psychology. When the front line can't take its commands visually, offensive bluff loses all of its teeth. In defensive formation the spread is slightly wider, meaning higher visibility on low ground – thus giving less control to overconfident gun-blades who are ill-inclined to pay attention, therefore offering tactics a chance to form its strategy."

The whole room laughs this time; the knot of engineers in the middle of the room even throws in a smattering of applause. Seifer twitches as if he's been pinched, but Balthier doesn't even look at him - he just leans his chin on his hand, rubbing a smug smile from the corner of his mouth with his thumb.

"Class," Quistis scolds, clapping her hands sharply. "Let's move on. Thank you, Balthier, for your unorthodox, highly detailed tactical assessment – though a simple explanation of close file versus spread formation would have done."

Balthier's widening smile is unmistakeably fond. "My apologies for derailing the lesson, Instructor Trepe."

He's good, Quistis muses, in spite of herself. He's really good.

By the end of class, the master study panel on Quistis' desk is humming with activity – most of them notes for the new engineer, based on their subject lines.

Subj: Clever deconst., Cheers  
Subj: Welcome to 3A  
Subj: Good 2 Have U, Bunansa  
Subj: Welcome Balthere (sp?)

Great, an instant celebrity. Quistis pinches the bridge of her nose.

But, before she resets the study forum to clear all of Balthier's fan mail, she sends him a note of her own.

Subj: For Your Information

There's a rule against personal correspondence on the study panels during class. Nobody follows it in 3A, as you've already seen, but it's worth mentioning that you'll get detention if you're caught socializing on another instructor's time.

A moment's consideration passes, and she adds –

Impressive work today. Welcome to Balamb.  
Quistis Trepe, Instructor 14

Quistis' note arrives at Balthier's desk right as he's shaking hands with the last of the engineering students who have queued to greet him. He glances down at the study panel, then up and across to Quistis, straightening his spectacles with a plainly apologetic look.

Then, The Mob arrives at her desk.

"Hey Quistis - if you got a minute I wanted to..."  
"Instructor Trepe - Instructor - Could I have a sec..."  
"Instructor, is there gonna be a pop quiz on that Dollet thing in drills on Friday? I just thought maybe you..."  
"Quistis - I sent you my third draft over session break - did you..."

Balthier's eyes narrow slightly with amusement. Quistis nods in reassurance - that's the breaks around here - and a small smile of gratitude twitches the corner of his mouth.

He's not cute. He's adorable.

"Looks like you've got competition for the biggest fan club now," Xu remarks drily, shouldering her messenger bag. "See you, Quistis."

"Yeah," Quistis says, vaguely.

As Quistis is clearing away the last of the Mob - mostly nervous first-years worried about pop quizzes - The main panel lights up with one incoming message.

From: Panel17********  
Subj: RE: FYI

Rule duly noted. Not easy being popular. Apologies.  
Might I socialize on your time? Lunch?

\- Balthier Bunansa

Apalled - flattered - Quistis looks up from her desk.

The room is empty.


	2. Chapter 2

It takes Quistis fifteen minutes to make her way from 3A to the lunch line. The queue at the lunch counter is unusually long today, roiling with conversation and impatience fueled by low blood sugar, so she settles herself at an inconspicuous seat in a relatively quiet corner of the cafeteria and begins unpacking the tediously large stack of transcripts she had spent so much time shuffling into her messenger bag after second period.

"You've arrived at last," says a voice.

Quistis jumps. "Wh...? Oh, Mr. Balthier – Hello. I didn't see you."

He's leaning against the wall a few dozen feet away, arms folded nonchalantly, as if he's been standing there for hours and couldn't possibly have anything better to do than look at her. His eyes crinkle with amusement.

"Ah – to be candid, I was beginning to think I'd been stood up, Miss Instructor."

Quistis freezes. Something in her face must betray panic because Balthier's smile falls immediately, and he scratches the back of his neck.

"I apologize – that remark was inappropriate, to say the least. I retract it."

Quistis tries to busy herself with the stack of transcripts, pretends to let his apology roll past her. He isn't her business, and neither is his stupidly formal small-talk. She has work to do. But just as she thinks she can convince herself to ignore him, he clears his throat and offers, tentatively:

"Might I join you?"

Quistis gestures redundantly to the stack of transcripts. "I'm busy at the moment."

She wants nothing more than to pick up her red pen and make a sea of corrections in each student's folder, focused to the point of madness until every last possible performance assessment has been written – if only to be rid of this new problem called Balthier Bunansa.

At least for now.

"I'll not disturb you," he says, suddenly confident, and takes the chair directly opposite her. Quietly, he takes out a little white book of paper and starts drawing in it with a bit of pencil from his breast pocket.

Quistis decides to let him be. And then she fidgets. Occasionally she sees him in her peripheral vision, spectacles sliding down his nose, absurdly stubby drafting pencil scratching earnestly. She's horrified to find that he's not just adorable, in fact; he's stupidly gorgeous when he's concentrating.

She wonders how old he is. She nips the tip of her tongue with her teeth, angry at herself. She carries on with her work, misspells assessment, scratches it out.

"Have you been teaching long?" Balthier asks, after a few minutes.

Quistis decides that this is fair conversation; she can think and talk shop at the same time. "I'm on an intermediary assignment. I get two semesters on staff until my commencement. I'll be SeeD by this time next year."

"Truly? Well, perhaps I should be calling you SeeD Trepe, then." Surprised, Balthier straightens in his chair and offers her a crisp salute. The back of his hand is smudged slightly with graphite, but Quistis notes his fingernails are perfect.

"Not yet," she says, smiling ruefully.

"Though - a clever woman like you should hardly be put in th' line of fire," Balthier remarks amiably, putting his stub of pencil in the corner of his mouth and rooting in his pocket for something.

Quistis is immediately appalled. "Excuse me?"

('Clever woman like you' – of all the misogynistic -)

Balthier produces an eraser from his pocket - his face falls at the look of disgust on Quistis' face.

"No, Instructor – er. That is, I'm sure you have other things you would rather do," he stammers. "War doesn't suit you."

Quistis pushes a strand of hair away from her face. "Not that you would know what suits me and what doesn't - but, no. War doesn't suit anybody, as a matter of fact."

Balthier has the good sense to look guilty, and Quistis exhales, annoyed with herself. Why is she being so testy? He's just a transfer student; he's being sociable; he hasn't done anything to deserve being snapped at.

"Yes, there are other things I'd rather do," She explains, straightening her tortoiseshell glasses. "But this is my home, and if Galbadia wants the best for SeeD and thinks I'm good enough, then I'll do what I'm asked."

Balthier rests his chin on his knuckles and frowns. "That's quite, er, noble of you."

Quistis pushes her glasses into place, annoyance flaring again. Clearly he thinks he can pander to her.

"I wouldn't call it that."

"And how do you pass your off-duty hours? Or, I imagine I should ask - do you have them?"

Quistis' lips curve automatically, but his effort at self-effacement, paired with a sloppy change of subject, isn't exactly amusing. "After six o'clock I'm just another student here. Saturdays and Sundays I usually end up in my dorm room, studying."

Balthier smirks carefully. "Your situation is terribly unique, I'd imagine – isn't staff allowed to socialize at all?"

"I'm surprisingly in demand on my week-end, actually," Quistis lies, thinking of The Mob. "It's flattering, if a little exhausting."

Balthier's eyes flick back to his notebook as he sets to shading something with the flat side of his pencil. His lips twitch."The perils of fame, Miss Instructor?"

"Please – call me Quistis."

The sentence tumbles out of her mouth before she's really thought about it. Startled, Balthier glances up from his work. Their eyes meet.

"Quistis," he repeats, slowly.

Gooseflesh rises on her arms – she almost blushes – but he pushes back from the table and gets to his feet all in one fluid motion, suddenly looking all around as if he's forgotten something important.

"Well. Before you assign me a week-end in detention reading Pericles' complete works for the sin of disturbing you, I'll leave you to your, er, lunch."

He's realized she doesn't have food in front of her. She'd forgotten herself – not that it matters. She'll just get something out of the vending machine in the staff room later.

"Thank you," she says.

"Regardless of any rules there may be about staff socializing with students, et cetera, I rather would like us to become, er, friends."

The sentence comes out of his mouth in such a quicksilver rush, Quistis has to blink.

There he is, standing straight as an arrow in the pristine black linen of a new uniform. He's been talking cream-tea Galbadian esprit – in fact practically flirting with her - for half an hour, and now she'll be damned if he isn't completely nervous all of a sudden.

Quistis blinks twice more, to clear her head. She's being silly; of course he's not flirting. He's a nervous second year engineer, anxious to make friends.

"Well. We should be seeing enough of each other between classes - I guess the possibility's there."

She straightens her glasses for what feels like the thousandth time, but he looks a little too pleased; somehow he hasn't caught the gentle tease in her voice.

"I'll excuse myself then, Instructor Trepe."

"Quistis."

"Who?" Balthier's eyes flicker with the mildest humor. "You're not off-hours yet."

Unexpectedly, he bows before turning toward the lunch queue. Quistis is unable to keep the blushing smile from her cheeks as he walks away.


	3. Chapter 3

Weeks pass, and along with them any hope for civility between the combat regimen and the tactical engineering school - At least in 3A.

Despite his nearly instant fame, Balthier isn't proving to be the high-and-mighty type at all. As lessons pass he sits quietly in the corner, ticking off notes in his little book and letting the other tactics students puzzle over mid-level scenarios on their own until dejected confusion sets in.

"If velocity equals seven, Miss Instructor, then the differential on the blade will be forty-nine, meaning the most probable armor buff is –"

A hand shoots into the air and Quistis redirects, trying not to smile. "Tilmitt?"

"Seven," Selphie says, comprehension dawning.

"Ohh, I get it," a knot of engineers in the third row choruses sarcastically, amused.

(Quistis shoves her glasses up her nose so The Mob won't see her smiling.)

Meanwhile, Seifer is bored. He leans across the aisle to Zell, making mysterious remarks about the state of things in intricate hand signals; Zell shrugs. He tips forward in his chair and throws little balls of paper onto Squall's desk. He pops the collar on his jacket and smooths it down again. He flexes his fingers, rolls his eyes, drowses in his chair.

One day, Xu raises her eyebrows significantly at Quistis - The Mob has begun taking bets on something. When Quistis reminds the class that gambling is grounds for expulsion - and throws in a meaningful glance at the front row - the ledger notebook passing between them under the desks quickly disappears.

Not before Quistis sees the running tally writ large at the top of the page, however.

BUNANSA – 12  
ALMASY – 7

For the love of Hyne, Quistis groans to herself.

Balthier hasn't moved from the back corner of the classroom. Hunched in the other corner, Seifer alternates on opposite days between ignoring him completely and bombarding him with ranting messages over the study panels. Today, he's chosen to conduct a public interrogation.

OPEN - Subj: Do you evn knw how 2 fire a Gunblade [791 char]  
OPEN - Subj: Tactics r for cowards [558 char]  
OPEN - Subj: Substitute run progression? RU high? [258 char]

Muted snickering hisses around the room, but Quistis doesn't bother opening the messages as they flash over the desk; she just glares at Seifer, flags his desk for conduct review (again), and moves on to the next line of her lesson plan.

"Let's reverse the last scenario. When the opposition has a buffer of fifteen, how many moves will pass before the party leader considers summon?"

"Do they have grenades?" Selphie asks, grinning.

"Of course they have grenades, Selphie, you pyro," Zell quips.

Balthier adjusts his glasses and taps something into his study panel. a minute later, three messages flick over the comm desk.

OPEN - Subj: Yes [3 char]  
OPEN - Subj: Opinion noted [13 char]  
OPEN - Subj: Not usually [12 char]

Quistis smiles faintly. When she looks up, Seifer is scowling at her, and when the bell rings he looks like he might vomit.

"Triple Triad lesson this evening, Instructor?" Balthier asks, sweeping past the desk.

Quistis glances up from her notes. He's nearly better at the game than she is, and he's only been playing for two weeks.

"Nineteen hundred hours?" she suggests.

"Cheers," he says. There's a laugh in his voice.

Seifer walks up and smacks the side of Quistis' inbox with his notebook. Quistis flinches.

"Hey - training room, noon Saturday," Seifer says to her, with a cold wink. "You're going down, Trepe."

"Sure," Quistis says, pushing her glasses up her nose. Balthier raises his eyebrows and walks away.

Seifer leans in, flashes his teeth. "You okay, Quis? Been a while."

"I'm fine."

"Have dinner with me on Sunday? We'll catch up."

"Can't," Quistis says. "I'm tutoring the pre-tactics class at seventeen hundred."

Seifer cracks his neck. "All work and no play. That sucks."

Quistis' lips twitch automatically, but she'd rather clean the training gauntlet floor with her tongue than actually smile.

"Yeah - Sorry I can't chat, but I've got a report to sketch out for Cid."

It isn't until the door closes behind him that Quistis realizes she's been grinding her teeth. She exhales, and her jaw cracks.

"Hyne," she breathes to herself.

The next day in third period, the back corner desk is empty. Quistis' eyes sweep over the rest of the room, wondering if Balthier's changed desks for some peculiar reason.

He isn't in the room at all. she nips the tip of her tongue with her teeth and glances down at her lesson plan.

"Now, class - preparing for the progress examination in April, I rather think we should discuss progressive benefit of Guardian Force leveling over time. Open your workbooks to-"

"For Hyne's sake," Seifer grunts, jabbing his hand into the air. "Quistis - I'm done with this."

"Seifer?" Quistis rocks back on her heels.

"You've been sweet on the Engineering students for a month, Trepe." Seifer throws his notebook onto the floor next to his desk and leans back in his chair, eyes half-lidded. "Every lesson is tactics and diplomacy, Calculus and psych, probability exercises – When are we gonna talk about neutralization procedure, huh?"

Quistis thinks. Training labs have been cake lately. She hasn't gotten a complaint from a single student over the past month - in fact half of them seem to be thriving on workbook drills, and the other half have doubled their practical application scores.

She looks round at the rest of the room and shrugs gamely. "I... there will be more than enough time to..."

Seifer's hand shoots into the air again. "Hey - I wasn't done. How 'bout flag-and-advance, or pattern combat, or fucking front-line prep?"

Quistis squints. "Language, Seifer."

He leans over his desk, suddenly livid. "Last year everything made sense. Assignments were alphabetical and by the book. We coulda slept through it all, sure – but at least the unit had half a chance to learn something. Now – hell, you've put combat tech on the shelf, Trepe. Admit it."

Quistis thinks briefly of the bruise Seifer left on her neck over the summer. She blinks hard to clear the memory, but immediately recalls the way he would wrap his hands around her upper arms, trying to make his fingers touch, telling her how slim and pretty she was, how he could just pick her up and carry her off.

Now he's staring at her like he owns her. Her stomach dips.

"I'm sorry you feel that way. But there are things that need to be addressed before -"

A vein in Seifer's neck jumps as he cuts her off. "This isn't about curriculum, Trepe, and you know it. This is about that faggot engineer."

The engineers in the room twist in their chairs, horrified, all attention drawn magnetically to Balthier's empty desk. Zell's jaw drops.

"Hyne, Seifer, what the freakin'..."

Seifer twitches. "Shut up, Zell – seriously, man, I will rearrange your face."

Squall twists in his chair - "Hey, Almasy, calm down. You're out of line."

Seifer stands up so fast his chair tips over with a crash. "Yeah? Do I look like I care? Bring it, Leonhart, come on. You got something you want to say to me all of a sudden? You gonna defend that little prick? Huh?"

Squall's mouth opens, but Zell explodes -

"The hell is wrong with you?"

Seifer turns to Zell and tears off his jacket. "Lots of things. Got a problem? Get it out of your system, Dincht. Let's rock."

Zell vaults his desk and puts Seifer in an arm lock. Squall curses and leaps to his feet, and the first-year sitting in front of Zell starts to cry.

Quistis kicks off her shoes and climbs onto her desk. "Sit down!" she yells.

As Squall throws himself into his chair, palms up, jaw tight, Quistis shoves her hair behind her ears and points at Seifer. Her throat feels like it's made of melted steel; she can't breathe.

"Seifer, I don't have any idea why you think you can act like -"

Seifer squares his posture. He looks like he's going to kill her.

"You just want that pussy Bunansa to shove his tongue down your throat! That's all this is!"

The oxygen in the room disappears - the floor tilts.

"Three days suspension, Almasy. One day for language, two more for gross insubordination – I don't even know where to begin."

Seifer throws up his arms. "Oh, Come on!"

Quistis twitches. "Almasy, if you raise your voice to me one more time, I swear to Hyne you'll hear from Headmaster Cid in the morning – and sit down, Dincht, or you're in detention on Sunday."

Zell makes a noise like a blender full of gravel and drops into his chair.

"I'm not wrong about this shit," Seifer says, eyes tracking around the room, his voice shivering. "You all know it. I'm not wrong."

"You're excused," Quistis snaps. The word tears straight out of her gut, a ball of acid. "Go to Headmaster Cid's office. Now."

The Mob stares, terrified.

Seifer scoops up his textbook, balls up a wad of tactics worksheets and throws them toward the wastebasket, and storms down the center aisle, breathing like a homicidal bomb.

The classroom door swings open, and Balthier looks guiltily round the threshold, hiking his messenger bag higher onto his shoulder, proffering a shred of paper.

"Er, pardon my tardiness, Instructor. I have a -"

Seifer grabs Balthier by the lapels and pins him to the wall, a vein in his forehead standing blue against the flush of his face.

"Listen, you faggoty little sh..."

Quistis' vision goes entirely grey with nauseous outrage - Her lesson notebook slams against the desk. The sound reverberates like a shot, and for a terrible moment nothing moves, excepting Seifer's furiously heaving chest and the second hand of the clock.

Xu has her hand over her mouth. She looks like she might cry.

"Er - there's no problem here - Steady on," Balthier says, softly.

Seifer's fist connects with the wall, a few inches to the right of Balthier's neck. "Fuck you," he breathes. "I'm gonna split you down the middle like a Hyne-be-damned anatomy test."

Selphie whimpers.

Balthier straightens in one fluid motion, arranging himself for a fight. He's not wearing his spectacles; his eyes are the color of a ripe, tart apple. His face is so still he looks like a waxwork, lips slightly parted - he's not afraid, but he should be - Seifer's taller, and heavier, and angry, and he wants to draw blood.

"Say that a little bit slower, won't you?" Balthier says, in a strange dark voice.

Quistis strides to the wall behind her desk. Her knees are shaking, her throat is on fire, and she wants to bolt from the room - (You just want that pussy Bunansa to) - but she makes a fist over the security alarm button and turns toward the rest of the class, demonstrative, trying to look imposing. Her whole arm shakes.

"If you know what's good for you, Seifer, you're going to walk out of this room. Right now."

Seifer drops his fist from the wall and turns hard on his heel, purple with wrath. The door slams behind him so hard the blackboard shakes.

"...Interesting," Balthier breathes, on an exhale.

"Take your seat, Mister Bunansa," Quistis says weakly. "Everyone, please open your texts to page seven hundred and nine, appendix four. Copy the defensive magick table into your notebooks and highlight the spells that require more than thirty-five percent of a battle round."

The room exhales at last, and pages riffle obediently. No-one makes a sound – but Xu's fingers tear like lightning over her study panel.

Five minutes later the main desk beeps twice.

From: Panel 8****  
Subj: Quisty

If Almasy comes near you again I'll rip his arms off. Be careful. Love you. - Xu

.

The bell rings, and the whole room moves at once in a flurry of pens and notebooks, rabidly anxious to get out into the halls and explode in gossip.

Balthier is the last to file out, as usual – but he pauses and lays both palms flat on Quistis' desk. The scrap of paper he pushes toward her has a small aeronautics puzzle sketched on one side; on the other is Headmaster Cid's signature, time, date.

"A note," he says, irrelevantly. "Was kept back in aviations lab. I - Miss Quistis -"

His mouth is a plump line of concentration and his eyes shiver earnestly over her face, trying to find a place to land. The top button of his jacket is missing, but he's pinned the collar shut with an aviator's pin. There's a smudge of grease on his jaw, and Quistis can smell the rubbing alcohol he's used to clean his hands.

"Should I be worried about this at all?" he murmurs. "About... you and... er -"

He leans in, conspiratorially, and now he's so close she can smell cologne. Her belly skips.

"You have a history with that... that bloke. And ...well. If he's hurt you, I don't mind saying that I -"

Quistis puts on her glasses and turns toward the study panel. "Don't come in late again, Bunansa."

He doesn't need to know a damn thing, and she can't afford to soften.

Balthier's eyes gloss over slightly as he steps back from her desk. "Yes, Instructor," he says, woodenly. "I apologize."

As the door shuts behind him with a meek little click, the desk beeps.

From: Panel?********  
Subj: Cry your mercy, Ms. Trepe

Elevator 4, 1830 hrs, please meet. I'm terribly, crushingly sorry if I've done anything wrong.

\- FMB (Balthier)

Quistis bends her head into her hands and starts to cry. She's in love - pinned to the wall like an insect, doe-eyed, dissolving - and she didn't even see it coming.


	4. Chapter 4

For the rest of the academic day, Quistis feels like she's walking on eggs. Her students stare hollowly at her, barely listening, as the main study panel at her desk beeps every half-minute. The room bends under the weight of a few dozen versions of Seifer's outburst; everyone has an opinion.

Five minutes from the last bell of final period, Quistis realizes she can't stand another second of the whole mess. Mechanically, she reaches across her desk and throws the kill-switch underneath the front drawer. An unsettling eerie hum rises in chorus from every desk in the room, and the study panels go dead simultaneously.

"What the...?" Zell says.

"Take out your textbooks, turn to page four hundred and seventeen, and write a paragraph on the benefits of Stealing in the first four turns of combat," Quistis intones.

"Instructor-" Balthier murmurs, tapping his study panel.

"The study panels are closed until tomorrow morning," Quistis says crisply, and walks out of the classroom.

Nobody follows her - Not even Balthier. She counts this a small miracle as she turns left into the stairwell, taking the stairs two at a time toward the study panel mainframe.

She has to have answers to this mess, or she'll never sleep again.

The mainframe desk is mercifully well-organized: All of Seifer's flagged messages from the afternoon before are waiting in a clearly marked folder for conduct review, and they haven't been touched.

Subj: Do you evn knw how 2 fire a Gunblade [791 char]  
Subj: Tactics r for cowards [558 char]  
Subj: Substitute run progression? RU high? [258 char]

Balthier's replies are lined neatly below:

Subj: Yes [3 char]  
Subj: Opinion Noted [13 char]  
Subj: Not Usually [11 char]

Quistis taps open Seifer's first message and nips the tip of her tongue bitterly at the wall of misspellings and grammatical mistakes. Seifer's meaning sinks through her slowly, like wet cement, and she finds herself grinding her teeth.

Subj: Do you evn knw how 2 fire a Gunblade  
You're awfully mouthy for a Galbadean. Think you can walk in here and impress everyone into thinking you're not a threat well I see straight through you, you're a spy for the bad guys aren't you? Ahahahahahahahahaha, I crack me up. Listen, cream tea, got any clue how to fire a gunblade? Have any clue at all what ur gonna be doing once you get out there on the ground where everything's blowing up all the time? Because I bet you think youre so smart. But its the smart ones that die the fastest. You need to watch your back bcause I'm gonna figure you out. So listen up: are you just gonna sit in the corner and talk flowery tactical shit until you can get your greasy fingers into Trepe's bra? Cause remember she's not on the market as long as I can help it. Save your breath or get bent.

Quistis' stomach turns. Balthier's reply queued underneath catches her eye before she can get too upset, though – there's something wrong with it.

Subj: Yes [3 char]

The last bracket is flickering. Puzzled, Quistis taps it with her fingernail – and a line of code springs up.

[panel:panel/comdesk:skip=]

Quistis' head swims. "Hyne – he's... evading the mainframe?"

But then, something strange occurs to her. Frowning at herself, she takes the attendance note he gave her out of her pocket, and looks at the little tactics puzzle he's sketched on the back.

It's not a tactics puzzle.

Buff A0 = m2 (449/velocity) + span1Q  
(comdesk:skip=auth02449)  
(important: panic button=1+Q)

Quistis pushes her hair behind her ears, bites her lower lip hard (I can't believe this), and types auth02449 after the blinking cursor at the bottom of the screen. It immediately blanks, then flashes with a short message, typed all in blue.

Subj: Yes  
In fact the GB91 you have under your desk was invented by my father. Been servicing & carrying one for five years. Lovely weapon... Truly, there's nothing to figure out, Almasy. I'm here in service, not spite. More importantly, I assure you that Ms. Trepe's underclothes aren't my business at all, and I'll thank you kindly not to talk roughly about her.

Balthier knows gunblades that well, and he's in tactics... what...? No, never mind. Quistis' head swims a little as she brings up Seifer's next flagged message.

Subj: Tactics r for cowards [558 char]  
You think your so fucking adorable dragging these moron first years through their paces you make me sick mother theresa you really do. Trepe's lost her mind, bcause your clearly a science coward who doesn't know the dif between a sim and a scrum run. I hope u get fucking chopped to bits when we land on dollet and your little engineer friends have to pick u out of some lizards teeth to send u home in a plastic bag I've seen the way you look at Trepe you little greasefaggot, I'm gonna make you sorry you transferred in here and made me look like an idiot.

Quistis' mouth has fallen open. She closes it, takes off her glasses, polishes them, and rocks a little in her chair. Memories flash through her, oddly contrasting to the rising dance of panic in her mind -

7/34/YY. Seifer punches her in the throat in training and ruptures one of her vocal chords. He shows up at her bedside in the infirmary the next day with a rose, and five soft kisses for the inside of her wrist.

8/19/YY. Seifer breaks three of her ribs in combat drill and she has to be put under sedation so they can be reset. He sneaks into her room, and writes love notes all over her arm with her favorite lip-liner while she sleeps.

Her lips press hard together as she summons Balthier's reply.

Subj: Opinion Noted  
For the record, Tactical engineering is reserved for men with solid constitution in Galbadia garden. Cowards we are not. Can't afford to be. Also I don't appreciate your language. Please calm down.

A thumping ache rises in Quistis' chest – she swallows hard, trying to ignore it, and brings up Seifer's last flagged note.

Subj: Substitute run progression? RU high? [258 char]  
Stop smiling at her or I'll personally track u down after class and break ur neck so help me Hyne you are so close to getting your ass turned inside out I dont care if youre smarter than me youre not stronger than me and I will fucking kill you so back off!

That neanderthal. Quistis shoves her glasses on again, murderous; she fumbles Balthier's access code twice on the last message. She mouths a couple of curse words, gets it right on the third try, exhales.

Subj: Not Usually  
SubRun is explained by Ms. Trepe as a viable approach on the message-board, under CMD:StudentTactics4. She'll smile as she likes, while we're on the subject, and so will I. If you have the audacity to threaten me again over her, I'll not be diplomatic. This is your last warning, Mr. Almasy.

Quistis bites her tongue hard - she tastes copper – then the office door opens.

Quistis' heart stops. Fumbling, she punches 1 and Q; the screen flicks innocently back to Seifer's conduct menu. Quistis looks up from the desk at Headmaster Cid, his kind, curious face framed by curls of steam from a fresh cup of coffee.

"What's the matter, Miss Trepe? You seem out of sorts."

"Headmaster – I'm reviewing Seifer's flagged desk activity. It seemed prudent, given the circumstances."

"Yes," Cid says gravely. "I just spoke with Mr. Almasy in my office, and he said I might find you here. He's rather upset about this whole mess and said so in quite a few words, so I sent him to his dorm to write lines. I hope he'll calm down. Tsk - would you like a cup of coffee?"

Quistis doesn't smile. "Thank you, no, Headmaster."

"From the sound of things, Ffamran Bunansa is too preoccupied to read his hate mail thoroughly," Headmaster Cid remarks as he sits beside her at the mainframe, smoothing down his sweater vest. He leans over and taps a decisive finger beside Balthier's subject lines. "That's a good lad, keeping his replies crisp and to the point. Well, it's all for the best, I imagine. Ffamran's a bright young man; it'd be a shame to see him caught up in one of Almasy's moods."

"I agree," Quistis says. Her hands tremble in her lap.

"Thank you for taking the initiative to suspend Seifer, Miss Trepe," Cid continues kindly. "I know it must have been a difficult decision - I'm led to understand you have a bit of a romantic history with the boy. But you know our harassment policy better than anyone. This kind of rambling anger can't influence our students on any level, and Seifer needs to learn that eventually." Cid eases himself to his feet and takes a contemplative sip of his coffee. "Almasy may be one of our best guns, but he doesn't have the right to verbally abuse anyone."

Quistis wants to say something insightful, but her vision is going fuzzy. Of course – Cid thinks she read Seifer's notes as they came across her desk, and then suspended him for bullying Balthier.

She turns up one palm in a shrug and smiles through a wave of nausea, sliding her other hand (still clutching Balthier's comm desk code) into her pocket.

"I do what I can, Headmaster."

Cid nods once, satisfied. "Three days on academic leave should teach Almasy something about common courtesy. Now – Miss Trepe –"

He sets down his coffee, and Quistis' heart sinks – his face has fallen.

"I need to ask you something a little uncomfortable," He admits. "I hope you won't think less of me for being concerned about this, but Seifer has it in his head that you're – well, rather fond of Mr. Bunansa."

"Fond?" Quistis repeats, hating herself. "He's a good student, and very considerate. He's asked me to teach him a little Triple Triad."

She really shouldn't have mentioned cards. The little glint that pops into Balthier's eyes when she trumps his best move makes her throat turn to sand, and now she can see him in technicolor, peering at her in mock challenge over a fan of cards. She swallows once, frowns thoughtfully, hunts for a reassuring phrase - But now her memory is on a roll, informing her exactly how fond of Balthier she really is.

When she mentioned to Xu during third period last week that she didn't have anything for lunch, Balthier bought her a sandwich and left it on her desk in time for fifth period, with a note – Keep your strength up, miss Instructor: The first-years have that hungry look about them.

And in drills, three days ago, when her safety buffer failed during a demonstration opposite a Rexaur, he drew his gun-blade before anyone else had noticed there was anything out of place. When the immediate danger passed – a simple matter of recasting her buffer – she noticed that he'd gone very white.

Oh - Balthier is definitely something to be worried about.

"Mr. Bunansa isn't a problem at all," Quistis says firmly, more to herself than to Cid. "Seifer's just upset with me."

The headmaster merely nods again, gravely. "I'll take you for your word. But, I will say one thing; Seifer had a point about your lesson plans, miss Trepe. They're a bit lopsided. Give ground combat a bit of a chance for a few weeks, all right?"

"I've just been a little fascinated with theory lately. It's my own fault." Quistis feels like her voice is coming from somewhere very far away; she barely recognizes it. "It won't happen again, sir."

Shaking herself slightly, she looks at the time flashing in the corner of the study panel. It's nearly eighteen hundred; she hasn't eaten since breakfast. Balthier will be waiting for her in half an hour, and she can't imagine how she's going to face him - oh, Hyne...

Cid puts his hand on her shoulder. His eyes crinkle kindly. "Quistis, my dear, you look tired. Put this nonsense away, and talk to me for a moment."

With one hand the headmaster sweeps through Seifer's flags and Balthier's secret replies; they file off the screen and away. Then he sits beside Quistis again and rests his hand on her wrist.

"You're a very clever young lady, Miss Trepe. Don't let Seifer get to you. Some gentlemen don't know how to behave around the people they care about, you see."

Quistis looks over at him. "Headmaster – thank you for being concerned bout me, and I'm awfully sorry about this. But may I ...aahm... be excused?"

A yawn cuts her courtesy down the middle, and her head spins. She's so tired and frightened, she thinks she might faint.

Cid's brows lift. "Of course, I'm being ridiculous - you need to lie down. Please, Quistis, go straight to your dormitory, and don't think another moment on this whole suspension fiasco. I'll take care of the paperwork."

"Thank you," Quistis says meekly, and pads quietly out of the mainframe office to the elevator.

As she slumps against the elevator wall, listening to the hum of the mechanism as it lifts her toward her dorm, she realizes something that makes tears of defeated frustration leap into her eyes.

She's half starved, hair a-shambles, makeup worn to nothing, and she can't think of anyone she'd rather collide with in all her exhaustion than Ffamran M. Balthier Bunansa, because – Quistis closes her eyes at the thought, swaying - he will smile, and the whole wretched day will disappear.


	5. Chapter 5

Quistis pulls her hair away from her face, straightens her shoulders, looks at herself sidelong in the mirror, and tries to remember how to pull rank on someone her own age. "You have no right to hack into ... no right to evade the mainframe for the sake of intimidating ... of confronting Almasy. ...Seifer," she informs her reflection.

Immediately Balthier's caramel drawl replies in her mind, inquiring suspiciously "Oh? And what is Seifer to you, exactly?"

She doesn't know anymore. But –

"That's not the point," she objects, frowning at herself in the mirror. "He's my – he's very – um, simply put – ugh. He's not worth discussion," she insists. But of course he is. Seifer's always worth discussion. He demands discussion even when he's not in the room. He takes up far too many corners of her mind these days. But she can't admit that to –

"Balthier," she mutters to herself.

She can't face him. He'll turn her in a frantic little circle of blushing flattery, then talk her straight to sleep. He'll make her laugh and stammer and bring color into her cheeks – and when she's forgotten her own name he'll walk away, whistling.

"Honestly," Quistis says aloud to her reflection, quite suddenly. "Let's not get ahead of ourselves. The situation's blown over. Bunansa doesn't need to know a thing about the mainframe. For all he's aware I don't know a thing, and that's best for all concerned. Of course."

But the sun is setting, and her stomach hurts. She thinks for a minute about walking into the courtyard and picking an apple from the tree on the bottom quad near the stage. She wants to cut the peel from it with her pocketknife in one long curling strip, cut it into crescents, and take the rest of the night to eat it. She wants to run into the back courtyard and turn cartwheels in the grass. She wants to kickbox with her shadow on the roof. She wants to do a hundred lovely and strange things she's never done before.

Well. Kissing Balthier would make a hundred and one – That isn't the point.

Quistis presses the heels of her hands into her eyes and groans. Clearly the only answer is to go straight to bed. She'll get up at four hundred hours, take a book of poetry to the training center, and listen to the gamekeepers work while she reads. The thought braces her and she turns away from the mirror, thinking of hot cocoa, Shakespeare, and a cool white pillowcase. In fact, she nearly has her wits about her when she realizes that it's eighteen hundred and thirty.

She remembers Balthier's clever pale face in a rush; she sees his worried golden eyes and hears the soft terrible weight of his voice.

"I was beginning to think I'd been stood up."

"...If he's hurt you, I don't mind saying that I..."

No – she can't leave him there to worry and wait - Convictions forgotten, flushing pink, Quistis strides to the door and opens it.

Seifer is standing there, about to knock. Instead he takes a slow swaying step away from the doorframe, his eyes thinning like the sheaths of daggers. If Quistis didn't know any better she'd say he was drunk.

"Goin' somewhere?" he asks. "Cause we need to talk about this."

"No," Says Quistis, as firmly as she can. "We don't."

"Bunansa's a prick," Seifer spits. "He's a rich poofy arrogant asshole and y–"

"There's a reason Bunansa antagonizes you, Seifer," Quistis interjects, as calmly as she can. "You don't give him much of a reason to treat you well, you know."

Seifer goes milk-white with rage. "You know, you sound really familiar right now, Trepe. Put a little Galbadian spin on that and run it by me again? I'll try not to forget who I'm talking to and punch you in the throat."

Quistis thinks distantly of all the other times he's said something dark and threatening like this, as if he can't let her pull rank without losing himself in the exchange. He's Almasy. He's bigger, and he has a shiny gunblade, and he knows how to use it.

As an afterthought, Balthier's voice creeps into her mind, his eyes glittering sardonically at her over a fan of Triple Triad cards.

"Pity his manners aren't as polished as his gunblade, hm?"

"Balthier -"

"Forget I spoke – cry your mercy. It's your move, instructor."

Down the hall and far away, Quistis hears the elevator slide open; Balthier's timing is impeccable. Suddenly woozy, Quistis rearranges her spine and looks Seifer dead in the eye.

"I'm not impressed with the way you're handling yourself, Seifer. There's a reason you were suspended for the weekend, and I think you should be in your dormitory thinking about how you're going to rectify the situation with Administration. You know Balamb's policy on student violence."

Seifer scowls. "Oh, now you're getting all Instructor 14 on me? Hyne I hate it when you do this. You like me. Why are you always acting like we're not totally into each other? Come on."

He leans against the wall, closer to her now, and she can smell him – gun oil and graphite mix with the smell of the cedar block he keeps in his dresser drawer. His eyes are silver with tension, and when he smiles Quistis' belly drops like lead.

"I'm your favorite," he says slowly.

Strangely, she hates him.

"Your suspension is lifted Monday morning at Seven Hundred," she says firmly, under her breath. "Until then, please don't speak to me."

As if he were Xu, or some first-year, or an overpolite librarian, Quistis turns on her heel and walks toward the elevator. Seifer watches her go, and she can feel his eyes boring holes into her shoulder blades until she is nearly to the elevator.

Balthier stands against the railing on the breezeway just to the north of the elevator; to Quistis' surprise, he is still in his uniform. It is immaculately pressed, panther-black, insignia pins lined perfectly along the ridge above his breast pocket. His hands behind his back, he seems to brace himself as she approaches; he salutes her half-informally, right hand softly raised by his jaw, eyes full of apology.

He's beautiful.

"What's the occasion, Bunansa?" Quistis asks as casually as she can.

"Hoping to charm my way out of the firing squad," Balthier drawls. His eyes are still hesitant. "I couldn't find a proper cup of tea in the canteen – though I begged, to be sure. I hope you're not adverse to chocolate."

His left hand comes from behind his back, proffering a wide porcelain mug. Quistis gawks at it; a curl of steam rises around a single fat marshmallow sprinkled with cinnamon, floating in a small placid lake of dark, milky hot cocoa. It smells amazing. The tension in her neck melts at the very thought of tasting it. But - is he bribing her? Clearly he feels guilty as sin for something. Seifer? The Mainframe? Something more?

Confused, Quistis' eyes slide from the steaming mug to Balthier's face. He turns his eyes to the floor.

"Seifer's not pleased with his lot, I gather," he says. He doesn't sound as pleased by this as Quistis had expected him to be.

"Seifer's hardly ever pleased with anything," she finally admits.

The thick tension between them lifts slightly as he looks back up at her; she accepts the mug of cocoa with both hands. Their fingers brush.

"Pacis Indutiae?" Balthier mutters. His eyes are turning colours; hazel, streaks of parched green.

"I wasn't aware we needed to strike a truce," Quistis replies. (She won't kiss him. She wants, needs to kiss him. She won't.)

"I just told Seifer to – ugh," She blurts suddenly. "I'm going to die right here. I'm going to wither and die, holding this mug of chocolate, young and foolish and completely out of my mind."

Balthier's lips twitch. "You'd best drink up, then."

Quistis feels her belly skip as she looks hard at him, uncertain whether or not to laugh; the tic at the corner of his mouth widens into a slow smile that creases his eyes. His cheeks flush handsomely and he waves one hand at her insistently, half-chuckling.

"Really. If your day's been so cruel as to slay you, drink before you don't have the chance, eh?"

Quistis actually giggles as she takes the first sip. The cocoa doesn't taste like anything she's familiar with. It's dark and smooth, creamy, with a hint of cinnamon; nothing like the watery powdered stuff served in winter at the canteen. She makes a small sound of surprise.

"It is good, isn't it?" Balthier murmurs, in a strange voice. "Er. If I may..."

"Hm?" she says, sipping again, hiding her blush behind the tilt of the cup.

"Why do you let Seifer - er - treat you that way?"

Quistis flinches and lowers the cup, cradling it in both hands like something fragile.

"You saw...?"

Balthier's face falls into a conflicted scowl. "I can't say I understand how a man could treat, er - someone like you - with that sort of disregard."

Quistis raises her eyebrows softly, thinking about Balthier's blazing eyes as he straightened to his full height under Seifer's glare in the classroom that morning. "You don't know what he's capable of," she murmurs, ducking her head again to sip the rapidly cooling mug of cocoa.

Balthier barks a sudden derisive chuckle, then shakes his head briskly; his eyes are red with frustration. "Ha! Bugger – No, all right, I'll grant you that much perhaps I don't. But – if he's hurt you – Presumptious, I know, and I pray you'll forgive me, but I rather like the thought of carving the smile off his face..."

Quistis straightens, bitterly disappointed that he'd say something so savage, so Seifer.

"What happened to charming your way out of the firing squad, Bunansa?" she demands.

"You won't die young and foolish." Balthier slouches against the rail, sullen. "You're going to live to be a very old woman, Instructor."

Quistis frowns at him, certain she should be offended by this. "And what is that supposed to mean, exactly?"

"It would still be true if you died tomorrow," Balthier snaps. "If you came to your end this very moment you'd die timid, brittile in the heart, like every other half-mad, book drunk, maiden aunt librarian in this place who thinks she can carry on without the world and it won't miss her. You're perhaps seventeen, I'm presuming; and what good is it doing you? Where is your heart, dear, your spirit? What is your opinion, darling? Have you ever considered slipping out on a week-end and getting utterly drunk and forgetting the world ever wanted you for anything more than your smile? Have you ever really given a damn about life?"

Quistis' heart jams in her throat. "I might very well expel you for speaking to me like this."

Balthier's eyebrows lift slightly. "Someone has to. How else are you ever going to get bloody furious enough to say it?"

Quistis feels like her head is full of helium - she wants to hit him - "What...?"

Balthier steps toward her and puts his hand against her arm, warm from the mug of cocoa, soft. His eyes shiver with restraint, concern, bitterness.

"Tell me - What do you want, Quistis Trepe?"

Her mind spins into sudden terrified stillness, and something dark moves there -

Don't ask for what can't be had – Not right – not fair – leave me alone

The mug of cocoa drops from Quistis' hands and shatters at Balthier's feet. He leaps back and curses, indelicate, but there's no time to think about it any longer – she turns and runs from him, sticky dark footprints of spattered chocolate on the carpet, the thunder of hurt and confusion and hunger banging in her ears as she leaves the object of her desire far, far behind.


	6. Chapter 6

The roof is cold and windy, and a storm drives down upon the school from all angles. Quistis isn't dressed for weather. Her shoes slip on slick concrete, her jacket almost immediately sagging with wet, but she runs for the railing and lets herself rebound off it slightly. Her frustrated tears cool in the stinging wind immediately, saline diluted by the rain.

Balthier brought her the chocolate with the storm in mind, now she's sure of it. It makes her feel worse to run away from him and shut him out when he's been nothing but chivalrous. But she can't reconcile what a cheat he is. She can't get confused. She can't let him turn her inside out. He stands behind her now, on the stairwell leading into the dormitory, leaning hard off the railing with one arm stretched long. Over his other arm is a handsome fawn colored coat, thick and lined and spattered already with wayward slanting rain.

"Quistis."

Her name trips out of his mouth naturally, as if he actually knows her. She pretends she can't hear him and leans over the railing, looking down at scattered balconies battered with the storm. Xu's picnic table is going to get it bad, she thinks irrelevantly.

"Quistis, you'll catch pneumonia out here. If you're going to stand in the bluster and be afraid of me, at least have the decency to wear my coat. I ran it out of my dorm when I saw you were dashing for the exits."

"Why do you care? I'm not a child."

"I never said you were a child. But I'm a gentleman first, and a bastard only secondarily."

Quistis can't help herself. She takes a step toward him. "You're admitting you're indelicate and and cocky, to the point of infuriating me?"

"Readily." He jogs up the last three steps, putting one forearm over his head as if he's trying to save his hair. She almost smiles, as something in her belly clinches slightly. He's so proper it's adorable, and oh, it's so hard to be angry with him. But the clinching in her belly turns to a twist of discomfort, a wave of disdain. He's showing off. He's calculating. Something is awfully, deathly wrong with how sweet he is.

"Now then. My mum died of pneumonia, and I'm left behind, neurotic and stubborn about coats and such." He tries to tuck the coat around her shoulders and she shrugs it off; he has to grapple for it, barely avoiding letting it drop into the deepening puddle she's standing in. "Cry your mercy, but don't make me cross. I've had a hard week, you know."

Of all the nerve. Quistis almost stamps her foot at him. "You've had a hard week! I ought to give you detention."

Balthier's eyes flicker round for a half-instant and Quistis thinks she's hit him somewhere deep, but he blinks and tucks his chin, and his lips twitch into a tiny sad smile.

"I'm sorry. Snug up, instructor, please. I'll leave you to ask yourself about my questionable motives, but only once I'm assured you won't freeze in the interim."

Quistis frowns at him through a few strings of soaked strawberry hair. "What exactly are you up to?"

"We're discussing this, just now," he says, "Or, at least I'd thought as much. I'm a Galbadian of infuriating indelicacy, presently giving a damn about your wellbeing. Tch! Snug up, use all the buttons. Go on."

He's fussing with the collar of his overcoat around her shirt lapels, trying to fiddle out a way to protect her clothes, though they're already soaked. There's a familiarity in his eyes that makes the hair on her arms stand up. She fastens the last heavy bronze button, turns up the collar of the coat - it smells like licorice and aftershave.

"I meant, why are you in my class? You're smart enough to be instructing. Why not take up a tutoring position in the offices? You could admin-test for Headmaster Cid's remedial flight school, for the first-years..."

"...Ugh, it's pissing down awfully, isn't it? I'll get you under the tarps over C-block, then, shall I?" His redirect is so smooth, his voice so casually sincere, that Quistis suddenly wants to hit him.

"No. You won't. Never mind, this whole conversation is insane. I'm going inside."

Balthier quicksteps round in front of her. "Good. I'll come with you."

"Bunansa!" Quistis looks hard at him, chin tilted; he's about two inches taller, and his eyes are a heartstopping shade of bottle-green. "I am not your sister, and I am certainly not your girlfriend and I should be insulted that you're following me around like this, acting like you have half a say in what I do."

"...You should be, I'll agree. It's appalling of me. You're my instructor. I'm treading badly."

"Now you're agreeing, I suppose next thing I'll say you disagree with already, on principle! You're dodgy, Balthier, and you're caclulating..."

"That I concur with, as well. See? Wrong again, but still beautifully spot-on." He grins defiantly. "This is cracking fun - say something else."

"Balthier!"

"All right, all right! I'm sorry. I am. Cry your mercy, if I deserve it, which I'm not so sure of anymore. Bah." His eyes shine, and when his grin melts he looks horribly worried. "In all seriousness, Instructor - I came here to find out what happened this morning. My tardiness nearly cost me, and I'm buggered if I know why. Please, Instructor - Why was Almasy about to rightly kill me today?"

"I believe it might have something to do with your clever little hacking adventure," Qusitis says coolly. "The mainframe isn't a place for sparring matches, especially not when an instructor is the subject of said sparring match, and the whole thing is being shuffled past her under illegal pretenses."

Balthier's face falls. "You did read them, then? I thought..."

"I'm sure you thought quite a bit, Bunansa. Thought you could get away with posturing at Almasy? Thought I would be charmed enough by your witticisms to let you act like... like a complete... "

"...Arrogant bastard?" Balthier offers weakly, when her voice fails her.

"Stop that!" She really does stamp her foot, now. Balthier flinches.

"You're right," he insists. "I was in the wrong. I broke vital security protocols just to make a point. But Quistis, I can't stand..."

"You can't stand him, he can't stand you. You have questions about why he hates you? Why? You egg him on, you make him jealous!"

"I see that. But is there anything to be jealous of? What is he to you, really?"

"That is none of your business!"

"It becomes my business when a man threatens to kill me!" Balthier snaps.

"I have no idea why you've one through all this trouble just to twist me into knots," Quistis mutters. "I really have no idea."

Balthier's face goes hard. His lips twitch. "If you love Seifer, I'll cease and desist entirely, bugger, I'll vanish. I'll leave you be, and beat somoene else into the ground playing Triad on week-ends, and eat my lunches alone. I will, and my honour bound to it, if it's what you want. But I have to know, just one thing only." His face is wide and sad. "Why is Seifer threatened by me, Instructor?"

Quistis' head is buzzing. She can still feel Seifer's eyes boring into her, his finger pointed squarely at her chest, voice bouncing from every corner of the classroom -

You just want that pussy Bunansa to

You just want that pussy Bunansa to shove his tongue down your

"He thinks you love me," she says, as if it's ridiculous, and her heart thumps in her chest like she might die. She hasn't lied in a long time.

Balthier flinches for a split instant, but then Quistis thinks she must have been mistaken - He laughs a warm, friendly, relieved kind of laugh.

"Well, then! Why would he think something as astronomically silly as all that?"

Quistis shivering heart stops beating altogether and crashes into her abdomen, forcing her to laugh. She should be relieved, but she wants to vomit.

Astronomically silly. Astronomically silly. Astronomically.

Balthier is saying "I hope I've not overstepped my bounds in that direction by any means. I hope you know I care about you. You're... well, it's odd isn't it? You're my friend."

"Yes," Qusitis agrees, distantly. "Of course. That is, you're... you're mine, too."

"Oh, I am glad. Cheers. You'd never said it outright." Balthier smiles oddly, and the corners of his eyes crinkle with kindness and worry. I thought I was becoming some sort of horrid, creepingly obsessed adolescent for a moment. But, let this be clear - I want the best for you."

"Thank you," Quistis says as lightly as she can, fluffing the collar of his coat closer to her face. She wants to cry. She wants him to kiss her, she wants it more than she's ever wanted a thing. She wants to beg Please, be more than you are. Make Seifer vanish, make them all sorry they never knew me, not the way you do. I know you do. Let the papers grade themselves. Kiss me.

"...Of course, Almasy will want the same, if you love him, and won't want anyone to harm you, confuse you, etcetera." Balthier sniffs ruefully. "It's a shame he has to be so... physical about his anxiety, I'll hope you don't mind my saying so." He's speaking slowly and softly, reasonably, with restraint. He's so proper she could die. But a shadow of disappointment flits into his eyes as he adds,

"I suppose I ought to turn myself in, tell the Headmaster what I've been up to. I'll take a suspension and a demerit, but life goes on, they say."

He was defending her. He is her friend, and he cares, and she loves him for it. Her heart skips.

"Seifer tried to start a fight with me before you came in," She blurts, "right in front of the other students. Can you believe that? All twenty of them. Nearly put a hole in the wall, scared the life out of the first years, earned three days of detention in five seconds."

Balthier's eyes seem to come into focus. His uniform is heavy with rain, his hair plastered to his head, nearly black. "Brilliant work, Almasy," he murmurs. His voice is so low it rasps. "Well. What brought all that on, do you suppose?"

Quistis holds her breath for a moment. But of course her nerves are silly. Astronomically silly.

"He thinks I'm falling in love with you, actually." She tries to smile. "Bit of a distinction to make, don't you think?"

Balthier takes a step closer to her. "I would say so. How did you cope with that little accusation, hm?"

"I... I couldn't argue with him, actually."

Balthier's eyes sprak with half of a frown, confused. "And why not?"

"...Because he's right."

The rain starts to ease; the wind blusters slightly less. Quistis slowly, helplessly, wraps her arms around herself, snug in the coat that smells just like him, fussy aftershave and licorice and drafting pencil and engine grease.

"That sounds more likely to put him off me than anything else," Balthier says slowly.

"I suppose so," Quistis agrees.

"Are you trying to tell me that you love me, Quistis?" Balthier asks, brows lifted slightly, face fogged with some kind of disbelief.

"I suppose I am," she says.

"Then knock me over with a feather, if you please. Quistis, I... I'm stunned."

"Balthier," Quistis whispers. "I'm sorry. I just thought..."

His fingertip lands firmly on her lips. "No. Not a word about what you thought! And not a single apology either. Quistis, how can you ever think to apologize to me? Have you any idea, any idea at all, how much I've had to...?"

His voice cracks, and he catches her hands in his, fingers tucked in the spaces between one another, simple as if they've always been this way. He's standing so close she can smell his breath, and feel the damp body heat radiating from his completely ruined uniform. He looks like he might cry, all at once; Quistis' heart flutters.

"I've broken every rule in the book, every rule," Balthier murmurs, shaking his head. "How many rules can a man break? And all for this..."

"I hope it's all worth the trouble you'll be in," Quistis mutters.

"You're worth every kind of trouble I can hope to find," Balthier says in her ear. "You always will be."

She shakes her head, clamps down hard on her pounding heart, and throws her arms around his neck. When their mouths crash together he exhales, as if he's held his breath all his life. His mouth is soft, and his arms slink around her waist - and now she turns neatly inside out, falling gently like a leaf into the love she'd never known she wanted.


	7. Chapter 7

Balthier is holding Quistis Trepe in his arms. He is kissing her. The rain falls over them both, runs in a thin rivulet down the back of his neck, anchors him as she melts into him, surrendering. She loves him, loves himback,is drawn to him and trusts him and would let her defenses down like this.

Balthier reminds himself, very quietly in the back of his mind, that she has never kissed him before.

He remembers their last shoulders under his hands, he held onto her, kissed her with whatever sincerity he could spare, and there was so little time, her perfect face wide and hurt, and he pushed her away and ran, and she was screaming his n…

Balthier pulls Quistis a little closer. Her mouth breaks away from his and her forehead drops to rest on his shoulder. She is tense and quiet, but there is a hum of overwhelming lightness and relief cutting through her. She's holding back tears, or laughter, or both.

It's such a shame, Balthier thinks, and the thought is in his father's voice. He takes a deep breath of cold damp air.

"I'm very sorry." he hopes his sincerity isn't suspicious.

"Why?" Quistis' arms are still around his neck. She is shaking. He sees that his coat isn't doing much to keep her warm, and wraps his arms a little bit tighter around her waist.

"I've done my best to keep you dry, but I'm too late. And look, that little sun-break is gone. We may drown." He tuts at the sky and steps away from Quistis just slightly, his hand still on the small of her back. He turns toward the door down into F-block. The movement feels like the opening steps of a waltz, a man leading her partner to a dance floor. She's trying to lean against him, and he realizes that she's exhausted. She'll be even more tired in the morning, and it makes his stomach clench to think of it.

Quistis is struggling for words, staring into middle space, swaying a little. He tilts his head at her inquiringly, despite his grim understanding that he knows what she's about to say.

"Almasy was right about you," she says. "About you being… in love with me." Her brow is slightly furrowed. She looks woozy, as if she might trip over her own feet, or retch.

"Seifer Almasy is right about a lot of things," Balthier replies, keeping his voice light despite his worry. "Let's be going inside, now, and part company quietly. If I'm caught fraternising with an instructor I'll get the firing squad."

Quistis' eyes widen a fraction as she realizes; he's a student, she's just kissed a student. It's a familiar expression. Her terror at the thought of breaking the rules has anchored her to herself, and she no longer looks quite so ill. Her fear preserves her. Balthier smiles at her sadly.

"It's all right, Quistis, love," he says, forgetting himself for a moment. "Come, now– lean on me. Come inside."

She takes a step forward on the slick concrete, and then another, and then she slips. She turns her ankle, winces, curses at it, and laughs. She's too giddy to care that she's in pain, but now she can't put weight on her ankle. She's giggling with frustration, trying to cover the blossoming pain with the most sincere display of humor she can muster.

Balthier remembers this moment. He's given up on being alarmed by it. It's just proof that she's an actor, like him, and if she lies to him it's only because theatre is more compelling than reality. He knows she's in pain. He knows she's getting dizzy, has just realised it, but doesn't want him to know. And so he plays along. He murmurs to her as she becomes more and more disoriented, chuckles when she laughs angrily, supports her weight as she droops against him.

When she faints about ten feet from the door, he sets his jaw and doesn't look at her, instead peeling her out of his waterlogged wool coat and carrying her into the building.

This has all happened 's aBalthier is holding Quistis Trepe in his arms. He is kissing her. The rain falls over them both, runs in a thin rivulet down the back of his neck, anchors him as she melts into him, surrendering. She loves him, loves himback,is drawn to him and trusts him and would let her defenses down like this. Balthier reminds himself, very quietly in the back of his mind, that she has never kissed him before. He remembers their last shoulders under his hands, he held onto her, kissed her with whatever sincerity he could spare, and there was so little time, her perfect face wide and hurt, and he pushed her away and ran, and she was screaming his n… Balthier pulls Quistis a little closer. Her mouth breaks away from his and her forehead drops to rest on his shoulder. She is tense and quiet, but there is a hum of overwhelming lightness and relief cutting through her. She's holding back tears, or laughter, or both. It's such a shame, Balthier thinks, and the thought is in his father's voice. He takes a deep breath of cold damp air. "I'm very sorry." he hopes his sincerity isn't suspicious. "Why?" Quistis' arms are still around his neck. She is shaking. He sees that his coat isn't doing much to keep her warm, and wraps his arms a little bit tighter around her waist. "I've done my best to keep you dry, but I'm too late. And look, that little sun-break is gone. We may drown." He tuts at the sky and steps away from Quistis just slightly, his hand still on the small of her back. He turns toward the door down into F-block. The movement feels like the opening steps of a waltz, a man leading her partner to a dance floor. She's trying to lean against him, and he realizes that she's exhausted. She'll be even more tired in the morning, and it makes his stomach clench to think of it. Quistis is struggling for words, staring into middle space, swaying a little. He tilts his head at her inquiringly, despite his grim understanding that he knows what she's about to say. "Almasy was right about you," she says. "About you being… in love with me." Her brow is slightly furrowed. She looks woozy, as if she might trip over her own feet, or retch. "Seifer Almasy is right about a lot of things," Balthier replies, keeping his voice light despite his worry. "Let's be going inside, now, and part company quietly. If I'm caught fraternising with an instructor I'll get the firing squad." Quistis' eyes widen a fraction as she realizes; he's a student, she's just kissed a student. It's a familiar expression. Her terror at the thought of breaking the rules has anchored her to herself, and she no longer looks quite so ill. Her fear preserves her. Balthier smiles at her sadly. "It's all right, Quistis, love," he says, forgetting himself for a moment. "Come, now– lean on me. Come inside." She takes a step forward on the slick concrete, and then another, and then she slips. She turns her ankle, winces, curses at it, and laughs. She's too giddy to care that she's in pain, but now she can't put weight on her ankle. She's giggling with frustration, trying to cover the blossoming pain with the most sincere display of humor she can muster. Balthier remembers this moment. He's given up on being alarmed by it. It's just proof that she's an actor, like him, and if she lies to him it's only because theatre is more compelling than reality. He knows she's in pain. He knows she's getting dizzy, has just realised it, but doesn't want him to know. And so he plays along. He murmurs to her as she becomes more and more disoriented, chuckles when she laughs angrily, supports her weight as she droops against him. When she faints about ten feet from the door, he sets his jaw and doesn't look at her, instead peeling her out of his waterlogged wool coat and carrying her into the building. This has all happened before, and now that Quistis is unconscious he doesn't have to pretend that it hasn't. The fact that he has to hurry irritates him. Every time he comes back to Balamb Garden, he has to move faster and faster. He used to be able to enjoy the better part of a semester in one of Quistis' tactics classes before it got this complicated. He used to be able to avoid Almasy for much, much longer. Now he has to dodge punches, and break laws, and scramble his own study hall notes in case someone dangerous stumbles across them. No matter how careful he is, He never has time to relax and enjoy Quistis' company for long. To keep himself calm, Balthier reflects on how familiar the hallways are from the rooftop to her room, counting the paces. Eight from F-block's rooftop door to the main hallway. Twenty-four from the end of the instructors' dorms to Quistis' room. About ten paces from her door, Balthier sees balamb Security walking toward him, quickly, not alarmed enough yet to break into a run. He doesn't have a free hand to fish Quistis' badge out of her pocket, nor does he have the time – and wouldn't dream of doing it anyway, when she's unconscious – so he leans against comm button next to her door and recites the override code. "14QTB Cycle Four. Medical Emergency. Signature Bunansa, F." The door opens. He lays Quistis on the bed, drapes his coat over the foot of her bedframe to dry, and walks out of the room again without looking back. He can't afford to look back. He knows she's already forgetting him. He holds up his hands to the security guards. One already has their hand close to their stun baton. The other three are staring at him, uncertain whether to tell him to freeze or to ask him what in Hyne's name is going on. "I'm sorry, lads," Balthier says, "I just wanted to get her out of the rain before the sweep takes effect. Forgive me for alarming you. Highly irregular, and all that, someone like me breaking into an instructor's room. If you'll take me to Headmaster Cid, please?" He walks between them, hands still up, and lets them surround him. One of them – a second year, from the look of him – mutters "No trouble now, Bunansa." Balthier quirks an eyebrow at him and says "No, I don't believe there is, for the moment." Nonplussed, the guards silently walk him through F block to the lift, and no-one says a word. Balthier stands, hands folded, in the middle of the lift; two guards stand on either side of him, not looking at him, not looking at one another. To Balthier it seems the lift has never been so silent, or so slow. The lift opens to a blast of cold, damp air. To the guards' shock (and Balthier's frustration), the student commons on the ground floor is deserted. "What's happened?" one of the guards wonders aloud. "Please, gentlemen," Bathier says, perhaps a little tersely to hide his alarm. "Take me to the headmaster's office. It's a matter of great import." One of them tells him to shut up. He strides out of the lift, impatient, and beelines for Cid's office. The guards have to jog to keep up, but they aren't reprimanding him to slow down. They're getting foggy, sluggish. Balthier lets them drag behind him. He's already almost forgotten they're there. He doesn't have time to worry about them. He covers the wide deserted commons at a brisk walk. He doesn't dare break into a run, but he can't afford to drag his feet. There are consequences for falling behind schedule. His footfalls chant as he walks, don't stop, don't stop, don't stop. The school's clock tower begins to chime twenty hundred hours, and Balthier breaks into a sprint. He hears gunshots but does not look back toward them. He knows the guards are dead. He doesn't think about it. He can't do anything about it. Now he's thinking ahead, and every move he makes is a snapshot: the feel of the access panel under his hands– click. The light on the walls of the stairwell leading down into the mainframe– click. The glow of screens and the sound of his breathing in his head– click. Headmaster Cid is standing there in the dim green darkness of the garden mainframe, eyes downcast. Balthier snaps to attention – Balamb Garden's salute. "Headmaster." "Ffamran," Cid says heavily, "You're getting better at all of this, tactically speaking. I would be proud of you, if I weren't so disgusted with you." "Trust me when I say I relish your disgust. You wanted me to be a tactical engineer." "I wanted you to behave yourself, for once." "I won't behave myself if it means letting people die." There is a terse, eerie silence. Balthier feels like he is made of glass and electricity– fragile, quick, dangerous. Cid shakes his head, eyes still downcast, voice low. "There are sacrifices to be made in every game of chess–" "You're playing chess with children's lives! What justifies letting so many students march into this bloodbath when they don't even know what they're fighting?" "A calculated loss–" "Calculated! It's sadism. It'smadness." Cid finally raises his head, spreads his hands, and looks sadly down his nose at his son. Balthier feels the hair on the back of his neck stand up. "Why must we have this argument every time you come here?" Cid's voice is low and weary. "I've given you ample time to make sense of your circumstances, Ffamran. Once upon a time, Galbadia Garden needed a tactical engineer of pedigree and reputation. I sent you to themnot because you are the keenest of strategic minds, but because defending SeeD units against Ultimecia is our highest priority, and a father must assure that his son has an exemplary education." Balthier forces a mirthless smile. "Brainwashing doesn't work on me, old man." Cid scowls, but there is a strange look in his eyes. Is he thinking, or listening? "Galbadia Garden wanted you to create the tactical scenarios that would win the war for all of us." Cid furrows his brow, and now his voice is nearly wistful. "Ah, Ffamran. I was wrong about you. Your cleverness turned to arrogance before I knew what was happening. Tell me – why can't you understand that this is all for a greater good?" His voice is tender, but his face is collasping into a half-snarl. Bathier sneers in return, his heart pounding. "You traded me off to people who didn't know what you were really doing. Iwaswilling to help you. I would've fought your filthy war. But then I remembered why the war started, didn't I? You couldn't wipe that away. All right, you found a way to snap your fingers and destroyeveryone else'smemories, but…" Cid advances on his son. "Lower your voice." "You didn't think I could collapse the mainframe after the first reprogramming, but I did. You thought I'd forget why I was in tactics, and I didn't. You thought I'd somehow forget my own mother, if you kept me around Balamb long enough. You thought you could brainwash your own son. You're a wretched shell of a man, Cid, and I despise you." Cid offers a small, mocking smile. Rage simmers beneath it, and Balthier stares into his father's face with the same cocky confidence that he's learned to stare down any other lethal opponent. "Your affection for melodrama is unbecoming," Cid rejoins. "I'm always attacking you, am I? Always hurting you, hurting your friends, betraying your mother? I'm always the one who is wrong, aren't I, Ffamran? But tell me, now – If I left Balamb garden this very moment, and never came back, what would become of your companions? Didn't you tell me, once, you consider them your f…" "You're treading on thin ice, old man." Balthier's heart is pounding in his mouth, but Cid doesn't have to know that. He squares his shoulders and reaches for the butt of his rifle over his shoulder. "I should hope you know better than to allude to the idea of holding hostages. If you hurt even one student in this disgusting mockery of a Garden, I won't hesitate to kill you." Cidolphus doesn't respond– he's distracted, listening to something Balthier can't hear. His eyes are luminous with sorrow, with hope, with twisted zeal. Balthier's skin crawls. "There's nothing about this whole escapade that could possibly end well for you," Cid rejoins smoothly, after a moment. "You've turned your back on Galbadia, and SeeD, and your own father. There are consequences for your consistent meddling in affairs not your own. There's more at stake than you can imagine." Balthier smiles darkly. "I live for high stakes." "Very well." Cidolphus' hand twitches, and somewhere in the building, an alarm goes off. Balthier breaks into a sprint, through the mainframe, through a side door, down a hallway that he's aware will eventually lead to an underground maintenance tunnel long has thirty seconds to get to the end of the hall, but he knows it's too far. He knows he isn't going to make it. He also knows that he doesn't have to. Balthier is running. His legs burn. His lungs burn. It feels as if he has always been running. There is a gunshot. The bullet tears through his side, and it hurts like hell but it's a welcome pain. He drops to his knees. He sees Seifer in the distance down the dim hall in front of him. "You won't win," Seifer calls to him, almost snarling with conviction. His gunblade smokes. "You won't." There are the diffuse sounds of pandemonium in the dormitories two floors above, students woken by alarms, rushing through emergency protocols. Balthier crawls toward Seifer's dark form in the tunnel ahead of him, trying to shout, but the pain in his side steals his breath. It grows as he moves, splinters, drags him away from consciousness. It's a dream, he tells himself. A dream. You'll wake up any moment now. "Why would you do something like this, you slimy sonofabitch?" Seifer is a monolith of strength and suspicion, and his anger runs hot. "Were you going to use our tactics drills against us? Are you really so arrogant that you think we'd let that happen, you piece of shit?" "I'm trying to h– help– You're all going to die, if…" And then there is the pain and noise, and then there is nothing.ll happened before,and now that she's unconscious he doesn't have to pretend that it hasn't.

The fact that he has to hurry irritates him. Every time he comes back to Balamb Garden, he has to move faster and faster. He used to be able to enjoy the better part of a semester in one of Quistis' tactics classes before it got this complicated. He used to be able to avoid Almasy for much, much longer. Now he has to dodge punches, and break laws, and scramble his own study hall notes in case someone dangerous stumbles across them. No matter how careful he is, He never has time to relax and enjoy Quistis' company for long.

To keep himself calm, Balthier reflects on how familiar the hallways are from the rooftop to her room, counting the paces. Eight from F-block's rooftop door to the main hallway. Twenty-four from the end of the instructors' dorms to Quistis' room. About ten paces from her door, Balthier sees balamb Security walking toward him, quickly, not alarmed enough yet to break into a run. He doesn't have a free hand to fish Quistis' badge out of her pocket, nor does he have the time – and wouldn't dream of doing it anyway, when she's unconscious – so he leans against comm button next to her door and recites the override code.

"14QTB Cycle Four. Medical Emergency. Signature Bunansa, F."

The door opens. He lays Quistis on the bed, drapes his coat over the foot of her bedframe to dry, and walks out of the room again without looking back. He can't afford to look back. He knows she's already forgetting him.

He holds up his hands to the security guards. One already has their hand close to their stun baton. The other three are staring at him, uncertain whether to tell him to freeze or to ask him what in Hyne's name is going on.

"I'm sorry, lads," Balthier says, "I just wanted to get her out of the rain before the sweep takes effect. Forgive me for alarming you. Highly irregular, and all that, someone like me breaking into an instructor's room. If you'll take me to Headmaster Cid, please?"

He walks between them, hands still up, and lets them surround him. One of them – a second year, from the look of him – mutters "No trouble now, Bunansa."

Balthier quirks an eyebrow at him and says "No, I don't believe there is, for the moment."

Nonplussed, the guards silently walk him through F block to the lift, and no-one says a word. Balthier stands, hands folded, in the middle of the lift; two guards stand on either side of him, not looking at him, not looking at one another. To Balthier it seems the lift has never been so silent, or so slow.

The lift opens to a blast of cold, damp air. To the guards' shock (and Balthier's frustration), the student commons on the ground floor is deserted.

"What's happened?" one of the guards wonders aloud.

"Please, gentlemen," Bathier says, perhaps a little tersely to hide his alarm. "Take me to the headmaster's office. It's a matter of great import."

One of them tells him to shut up. He strides out of the lift, impatient, and beelines for Cid's office. The guards have to jog to keep up, but they aren't reprimanding him to slow down. They're getting foggy, sluggish. Balthier lets them drag behind him. He's already almost forgotten they're there. He doesn't have time to worry about them. He covers the wide deserted commons at a brisk walk. He doesn't dare break into a run, but he can't afford to drag his feet. There are consequences for falling behind schedule.

His footfalls chant as he walks,don't stop, don't stop, don't stop.

The school's clock tower begins to chime twenty hundred hours, and Balthier breaks into a sprint. He hears gunshots but does not look back toward them. He knows the guards are dead. He doesn't think about it. He can't do anything about it.

Now he's thinking ahead, and every move he makes is a snapshot: the feel of the access panel under his hands– click. The light on the walls of the stairwell leading down into the mainframe– click. The glow of screens and the sound of his breathing in his head– click.

Headmaster Cid is standing there in the dim green darkness of the garden mainframe, eyes downcast.

Balthier snaps to attention – Balamb Garden's salute. "Headmaster."

"Ffamran," Cid says heavily, "You're getting better at all of this, tactically speaking. I would be proud of you, if I weren't so disgusted with you."

"Trust me when I say I relish your disgust. You wanted me to be a tactical engineer."

"I wanted you to behave yourself, for once."

"I won't behave myself if it means letting people die."

There is a terse, eerie silence. Balthier feels like he is made of glass and electricity– fragile, quick, dangerous.

Cid shakes his head, eyes still downcast, voice low. "There are sacrifices to be made in every game of chess–"

"You're playing chess with children's lives! What justifies letting so many students march into this bloodbath when they don't even know what they're fighting?"

"A calculated loss–"

"Calculated! It's sadism. It'smadness."

Cid finally raises his head, spreads his hands, and looks sadly down his nose at his son. Balthier feels the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

"Why must we have this argument every time you come here?" Cid's voice is low and weary. "I've given you ample time to make sense of your circumstances, Ffamran. Once upon a time, Galbadia Garden needed a tactical engineer of pedigree and reputation. I sent you to themnot because you are the keenest of strategic minds, but because defending SeeD units against Ultimecia is our highest priority, and a father must assure that his son has an exemplary education."

Balthier forces a mirthless smile. "Brainwashing doesn't work on me, old man."

Cid scowls, but there is a strange look in his eyes. Is he thinking, or listening?

"Galbadia Garden wanted you to create the tactical scenarios that would win the war for all of us." Cid furrows his brow, and now his voice is nearly wistful. "Ah, Ffamran. I was wrong about you. Your cleverness turned to arrogance before I knew what was happening. Tell me – why can't you understand that this is all for a greater good?"

His voice is tender, but his face is collasping into a half-snarl. Bathier sneers in return, his heart pounding.

"You traded me off to people who didn't know what you were really doing. Iwaswilling to help you. I would've fought your filthy war. But then I remembered why the war started, didn't I? You couldn't wipe that away. All right, you found a way to snap your fingers and destroyeveryone else'smemories, but…"

Cid advances on his son. "Lower your voice."

"You didn't think I could collapse the mainframe after the first reprogramming, but I did. You thought I'd forget why I was in tactics, and I didn't. You thought I'd somehow forget my own mother, if you kept me around Balamb long enough. You thought you could brainwash your own son. You're a wretched shell of a man, Cid, and I despise you."

Cid offers a small, mocking smile. Rage simmers beneath it, and Balthier stares into his father's face with the same cocky confidence that he's learned to stare down any other lethal opponent.

"Your affection for melodrama is unbecoming," Cid rejoins. "I'm always attacking you, am I? Always hurting you, hurting your friends, betraying your mother? I'm always the one who is wrong, aren't I, Ffamran? But tell me, now – If I left Balamb garden this very moment, and never came back, what would become of your companions? Didn't you tell me, once, you consider them your f…"

"You're treading on thin ice, old man." Balthier's heart is pounding in his mouth, but Cid doesn't have to know that. He squares his shoulders and reaches for the butt of his rifle over his shoulder. "I should hope you know better than to allude to the idea of holding hostages. If you hurt even one student in this disgusting mockery of a Garden, I won't hesitate to kill you."

Cidolphus doesn't respond– he's distracted, listening to something Balthier can't hear. His eyes are luminous with sorrow, with hope, with twisted zeal. Balthier's skin crawls.

"There's nothing about this whole escapade that could possibly end well for you," Cid rejoins smoothly, after a moment. "You've turned your back on Galbadia, and SeeD, and your own father. There are consequences for your consistent meddling in affairs not your own. There's more at stake than you can imagine."

Balthier smiles darkly. "I live for high stakes."

"Very well."

Cidolphus' hand twitches, and somewhere in the building, an alarm goes off. Balthier breaks into a sprint, through the mainframe, through a side door, down a hallway that he's aware will eventually lead to an underground maintenance tunnel long has thirty seconds to get to the end of the hall, but he knows it's too far. He knows he isn't going to make it. He also knows that he doesn't have to.

Balthier is running. His legs burn. His lungs burn. It feels as if he has always been running.

There is a gunshot. The bullet tears through his side, and it hurts like hell but it's a welcome pain. He drops to his knees. He sees Seifer in the distance down the dim hall in front of him.

"You won't win," Seifer calls to him, almost snarling with conviction. His gunblade smokes. "You won't."

There are the diffuse sounds of pandemonium in the dormitories two floors above, students woken by alarms, rushing through emergency protocols.

Balthier crawls toward Seifer's dark form in the tunnel ahead of him, trying to shout, but the pain in his side steals his breath. It grows as he moves, splinters, drags him away from consciousness.

It's a dream,he tells 's a dream. You'll wake up any moment now.

"Why would you do something like this, you slimy sonofabitch?" Seifer is a monolith of strength and suspicion, and his anger runs hot. "Were you going to use our tactics drills against us? Are you really so arrogant that you think we'd let that happen, you piece of shit?"

"I'm trying to h– help– You're all going to die, if…"

And then there is the pain and noise, and then there is nothing.


End file.
